Proclaim The Gospel and Sing the Psalms, But Please Do It Without Emotion

Lectors, save the melodrama for your amateur dramatics, and keep it out of church

In the 1965 film The Greatest Story Ever Told, John Wayne plays a cameo role of the centurion who saw Jesus die, as related in Mark’s Gospel (15, 39): “And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, saw how he died, he said, ‘Surely this man was the Son of God!’ ”

So John Wayne had one line: “Surely, this man was the Son of God.” The late English film critic Barry Norman used to tell a story that on the first take after Wayne delivered the line, the director, George Stevens, shouted, “Cut!”, then ran over and put his arm around him. “That’s great John,” Stevens said. “But we need more emotion, can you give us some awe?” So, in the second take Jesus duly expired once more and John Wayne looked up at him and said: “Aw. Surely this man was the Son of God.”

I have no idea if this really happened, but Norman’s intention was to make fun of Wayne for wooden acting.

In fact, I have more sympathy for Wayne in this tale than perhaps I ought. I have always felt that the best actors erred, if they did so, towards underacting, rather than overacting. I find it difficult to go to amateur dramatics because most err in the other direction and overact. Most actors, it seems are taught to convey emotion whilst reading words. I accept that the portrayal of emotion has to be part of it, but the best actors, it seems to me, will suggest emotion through their art, but engage the viewer more powerfully because they allow for a personal response to their portrayal by underplaying it, and hence drawing in the viwers’ imagination.

The risk of overplaying emotion is that it tends to be melodramatic. In this case, the emotional portrayal dominates to such a degree that it stifles the imagination of the viewer, allowing for no personal response unless it happens to coincide with what the actor does. The skillfully underplayed part doesn’t dictate what emotion I should feel; rather it places me in the scene so that my imagination can supply it. The skilled actor therefore must portray enough emotion to stimulate the imagination, but not so much as to stifle a personal response. I think that John Wayne was skilled at striking this balance on screen, because he allowed the words to speak for themselves, and let his screen presence do the rest.

Storytelling, perhaps by reading from a book aloud, is not acting, and the need to let the words speak for themselves is even greater than in drama. While acting, which is just a highly developed skill of ‘let’s pretend’, does require an authentic portrayal of emotion to some degree, storytelling does not.

One of the best storytellers I have encountered was Garrison Keillor. For years he gave a monologue in his show The Prairie Home Companion, which was a story about the week’s events in a fictional town in Minnesota called Lake Wobegon. For the most part, he just told the story in a detached and unemotional way and really did allow the words, which he had written with great care, to speak for themselves. He did change his intonation in the dialogue a little so that you could distinguish one character from another as you were listening, And at key moments he did reflect a little of the emotion of a character, but it was always understated. Few actors would dare show such restraint, and Keillor never became his characters in the way that an actor would; it was always Garrison Keillor giving you words.

Again, the value of this is that it gives the listener space in their imaginations to create a rich personal picture of what is going on. Actors, even highly-skilled actors, are often not good storytellers because they often seem to want to act out the story too much, rather than tell it. It is difficult for them to step out of the way and let the words alone reveal the sense that the author wished to communicate.

Proclaiming the Gospel is also the telling of a story, but even more than any other, it is important that the words do the talking, and the reader not dictate emotion to the listeners. For this reason, I find the injection of emotion on the part of the lector at Mass utterly inappropriate. If ever there is a situation in which we want to give room for a personal response to the text, this is it. The less that the reader emotes and the more he keeps his own personality out of the way, the more God speaks to each person present through the words that He Himself authored.

The same is true of the Psalms, which are highly emotional in content. This emotional poetry is written in the original language in a form that Gerard Manley Hopkins called ‘sprung rhythm’, and this poetic structure will be present also in good translations. If the reader observes this rhythm, which is simply to allow for a set number of emphasized syllables in each line, then it is difficult to ‘act out’ the words of the psalmist. For the same reasons as given above, this is a good thing. The Holy Spirit speaks to us personally and powerfully through the text simply by our grasping the sense of what it says, and the injection of any emotion on the part of the reader stifles that personal response.

It is for this reason that traditional melodies for chanting the psalms and intoning the text are unemotional in nature. They are beautiful but do not impose any emotion onto the text. Likewise, within reason, just about any authentic psalm tone works with any psalm. It engages us, but directs us to the words on the page so that we can respond to them individually.

When melodies that have an emotional content embedded within them are used to sing the psalms, then it becomes less prayer and meditation, and more a performance that distracts from what the psalms are saying.

Oh no!

Guest Article: Bishop Athanasius Schneider on the Significance of Minor Ministries in the Sacred Liturgy

NLM is grateful to His Excellency Bishop Athanasius Schneider for offering us the first publication of his profound analysis of the ancient origins of the minor orders and their liturgical-theological rationale, together with a critique on that basis of the novel path taken in the post-conciliar period, from Ministeria Quaedam of 1972 to Spiritus Domini of 2021.

Ordination of lectors in the traditional Roman rite

The Significance of Minor Ministries in the Sacred Liturgy

1. The principle of Divine law in the liturgy

Regarding the nature of the sacred liturgy, that is, of Divine worship, God himself has spoken to us in His Holy Word, and the Church has explained it in her solemn Magisterium. The first basic aspect of the liturgy is this: God himself tells men how they must honor Him; in other words, it is God who gives concrete norms and laws for the development, even exterior, of the worship of His Divine Majesty.

In fact, man is wounded by original sin and for this reason he is profoundly characterized by pride and ignorance, and even more profoundly by the temptation and tendency to put himself in the place of God at the center of worship, that is, to practice self-worship in its various implicit and explicit forms. Liturgical law and norms are therefore necessary for authentic Divine worship. These laws and norms must be found in Divine Revelation, in the written word of God and in the word of God transmitted by tradition.

Divine Revelation transmits to us a rich and detailed liturgical legislation. An entire book of the Old Testament is dedicated to liturgical law, the Book of Leviticus; partially also the Book of Exodus. The individual liturgical norms of Divine worship of the Old Testament had only a transitory value, since their purpose was to be a figure, looking to the Divine worship that would reach its fullness in the New Testament. However, there are some elements of perennial validity: firstly, the very fact of the need for liturgical legislation; secondly, that there is a detailed and rich legislation of Divine worship; and finally, that Divine worship takes place according to a hierarchical order. This hierarchical order presents itself as concretely tripartite: high priest–priest–levite; in the New Testament, respectively: bishop–presbyter–deacon/minister.

Jesus came not to abolish the law, but to bring it to its fullness (cf. Mt 5:17). He said: “Until heaven and earth have passed away, not one iota or a sign of the law will pass, without all being completed” (Mt 5:18). This is particularly valid for Divine worship, since the adoration of God constitutes the first commandment of the Decalogue (cf. Ex 20, 3-5). The purpose of all creation is this: angels and men and even irrational creatures must praise and worship the Divine Majesty, as the revealed prayer of the Sanctus says: “The heavens and the earth are full of Thy glory” (cf. Is 6:3).

Old Covenant hierarchy

2. Jesus Christ, the supreme worshiper of the Father and the supreme liturgical minister

The first and most perfect worshiper of the Father is Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God. His work of salvation had as its main purpose to give honor and glory to the Father in place of sinful humanity, unable to give a worthy and acceptable worship to God. The re-establishment of true Divine worship and the atonement of Divine Majesty, outraged due to the innumerable forms of perversion of worship, constituted the primary purpose of the Incarnation and the work of Redemption.

By constituting His apostles true priests of the New Covenant, Jesus left His priesthood to His Church and with it the public worship of the New Testament, which has for its ritual culmination the offering of the Eucharistic sacrifice. He taught his apostles through the Holy Spirit that the worship of the New Covenant was to be the fulfillment of the worship of the Old Covenant. Thus the apostles transmitted their power and their liturgical service in three degrees, that is, in three hierarchical orders, in analogy with the three degrees of the ministers of the cult of the Old Covenant.

The supreme performer of the liturgy is Christ (in Greek: hó liturgós). He contains in himself and exercises all the Divine worship, even in the smallest functions. The following words of Christ can also be referred to this fact: “I am among you as one who serves” (Lk 22:27). Christ is the minister; he is also the “deacon” par excellence. So too is the bishop, as the supreme possessor of the liturgical service of Christ. The episcopate contains all the ministries and services of public worship: the ministry of the presbyterate, the ministry of the diaconate, the ministry of the minor orders, that is, also, the service of ministers (“altar boys”). In the pontifical Mass according to the most ancient form of the Roman rite, the bishop dresses in all the robes, even of the lower orders. In the absence of all the lower ministers, the bishop himself performs all the liturgical functions of the presbyter, of the deacon, and even of the minor orders, that is, of the altar servers. In the absence of the deacon, the presbyter himself performs all the liturgical functions of the deacon and of the minor orders, that is, of the altar servers. In the absence of the deacon, the sub-deacon, the holders of the minor orders, or the altar servers can perform some of the functions of the deacon.

The vesting of a pontiff

3. The tradition of the apostles

The apostolic tradition has seen in the triple hierarchical order of the Church the fulfillment of the typology of the triple hierarchical order of Divine worship in the Old Covenant. This is what Pope Saint Clement I, the disciple of the Apostles and third successor of the Apostle Peter, testifies to us.

In his letter to the Corinthians, Saint Clement presents the liturgical order divinely established in the Old Covenant as an exemplar for the right order of the hierarchy and worship of every Christian community. Speaking of Divine worship, he states:

We must do everything in order with regard to what the Lord has ordered to do according to the appointed times. He ordered the oblations and worship services to be performed not by chance or without order. By his sovereign decision, He Himself has determined where and by whom these services are to be performed, so that all things will be done in a holy manner according to His good pleasure and pleasing to His will. For the high priest has been assigned liturgical services (liturghíai) reserved for him, priests have been given their own proper place, on the levites devolve special ministrations (diakoníai), and the layman (ho laikòs ànthropos) is bound by the laws that pertain to laymen (laikóis prostágmasin). (1 Clem 40:1-3.5)

Pope Clement understands that the principles of this order divinely established in the Old Covenant must continue to operate in the life of the Church. The most evident reflection of this order should be found in the liturgical life, in the public worship of the Church. Thus the Holy Pontiff draws this conclusion, applied to the life and worship of Christians: “May each of you, brothers, in the position that is proper to him, be pleasing to God in good conscience and with reverence, without transgressing the established rule of liturgical services (kanón tes leiturghías)” (1 Clem 41:1).

Later (cf. 1 Clem 42:1ss.) Pope Clement describes the hierarchy of the New Covenant, contained in the Lord Jesus Christ himself and concretized in the mission of the apostles. This reality corresponds to the order (táxis) willed by God. Here Saint Clement uses the same terms with which he had previously described the liturgical and hierarchical order of the Old Covenant.

From the first centuries, the Church was aware that Divine worship had to take place according to an order established by God in keeping with the example of the Divine order established in the Ancient Covenant. Therefore, in order to carry out a task in public worship, it was necessary to belong to a hierarchical order. Consequently, Christian worship, that is, the Eucharistic liturgy, was carried out in a hierarchically ordered manner by persons officially appointed for this purpose. For this reason, these agents of worship constituted an order, a sacred order, divided into three degrees: episcopate, presbyterate and diaconate, paralleling the three degrees of ministers of Old Covenant worship: high priest, priests, and levites. Pope Saint Clement in the first century designated the service of the Old Testament levites with the word “diakonia” (1 Clem 40:5). We can therefore identify here the foundation of the ancient ecclesiastical tradition, since at least the fifth century, of designating the Christian deacon with the word “levite,” for example in the Constitutiones Apostolicae (2, 26:3) and in the writings of Pope Leo the Great (cf. Ep. 6:6; Ep. 14:4; Serm. 59:7; 85:2).
 

St. Peter ordains St. Stephen a deacon (Fra Angelico)

Continue Reading this Article. . .

On the Status of Minor Orders and the Subdiaconate

Roman subdiaconate ordination (post-1973!)

Arising more and more often nowadays is the question: What exactly is the status of the minor orders (porter, lector, exorcist, acolyte) in the Roman rite? We can add to this list the major order of subdeacon. In spite of their immense antiquity, which ought to have gained them the principled support of the liturgical reform — they are, for example, more ancient than the season of Advent — the minor orders were abolished in the form in which they had existed previously (or at least, it seemed to observers that they were abolished) by Paul VI in his Apostolic Letter Ministeria Quaedam of 1973. Yet never since that time have both minor orders and the subdiaconate ceased to be conferred in this or that corner of the vast Catholic world; with increasing frequency thanks to John Paul II’s Ecclesia Dei and Benedict XVI’s Summorum Pontificum, these orders are routinely imparted to the many young candidates who flock to traditional orders. It certainly seems like an odd situation.

As far as I can tell, there’s the “conservative” view and the “rad trad” view.

The conservative view, such as one might find it on the faculty of an Opus Dei university, is to say that the minor orders and subdiaconate were in fact abrogated and their functions reassigned, but that, just as the old liturgical tradition continued and was eventually regularized, so, too, the use of the ceremonies for the suppressed orders were regularized in that context, and are efficacious in that context. It’s “praetercanonical.”

The weakness of this position is that it leans too much on canon law. Canon law is not some kind of inerrant or infallible thing; it’s just a compilation of ecclesiastical jurisprudence, and it can be badly done, have omissions, need correction or supplementation, etc. Canon law’s silence on the minor orders and the subdiaconate does not logically preclude the possibility of their continuing existence. Not all things in heaven and on earth are contained in the 1983 Code of Canon Law.

With this, we segue into the rad trad position, which maintains that no pope has the authority to abolish a millennial tradition like the minor orders and the subdiaconate, just as no pope, strain he ever so many a pontifical muscle, could abolish the immemorial Roman Mass codified but not created by St. Pius V in 1570. On this view, Paul VI’s attempt to do both of these things wasn’t worth the paper it was written on. This has already, in a sense, been recognized regarding the Mass by Benedict XVI when he said in Summorum Pontificum that the old missal was never abrogated, even though nearly everyone, except a tiny number of traditionalists, acted as if it had been. Due to craven ultramontanism, however, people went along with the pretense and still act as if the minor orders and the subdiaconate were suppressed. Traditional religious and clerical communities, on the other hand, know better, and continue to follow the settled and venerable Roman tradition.

At very least something like the conservative view has to be true; otherwise, in conferring minor orders today (and most of all, the subdiaconate!), one would be guilty of simulating a conferral that cannot happen — a sort of contraceptive liturgy. It is impossible that the Church could continue to use such rites without their being efficacious in accomplishing what they intend to accomplish. A sacramental theologian of Scotistic subtlety might rejoinder that there is a third possibility: these rites are not efficacious in se — they actually do nothing to the recipients — but their content, being piously edifying, offers an occasion of grace for the devout in their progress toward the diaconate and priesthood. It would be essentially fancy playacting in the sight of God, publicly and solemnly marking stages of formation.

All of these positions seem ecclesiologically unsatisfactory in one way or another. The least problematic, it seems to me, is to maintain that the old rites, when used today, confer the orders they intend to confer, while admitting that how the order is regulated in the Church is governed by the 1983 Code of Canon Law. With the 1983 Code, Ministeria Quaedam became a moot point — of historical interest, no doubt, and offering guidelines for acolytes, etc., but it was superseded. Hence, by the only code currently in force, reception of tonsure does not make one a cleric. A man becomes a cleric with the diaconate. He can freely take upon himself the obligations for the Divine Office that once came with the subdiaconate, but he is not strictly bound by law until he is ordained a deacon.

That is not to say, as mentioned above, that this law is a good one and should not be changed in the future. Not is it to say that the commitment is not serious prior to the diaconate. There is a whole culture that goes with the minor orders: they set a person apart for liturgical offices and activities, preparing a man step by step, through lower forms of ministry, to receive the higher forms of the major orders, by which he is decisively inserted into the exercise of the priesthood of Jesus Christ in the Church.

Catholics were told that they should engage in ecumenism, but the one ecumenism that was forbidden was respecting the traditions we hold in common with the East. The minor orders and the subdiaconate abide in the Eastern churches. It is far more plausible to assume that they abide, and must abide, in the Roman Church as well.

Further reading: 

• Kevin Di Camillo, “What Were the ‘Minor Orders,’ and Why Do They Matter?”
• Father Dave Endres answers a question, exhibiting to perfection the mentality of those who see things in the simplistic terms: “before Paul VI, we did X; now we only do Y.”
• Modern Medievalism: “More than boys; why men are needed to serve the altar”

Visit Dr. Kwasniewski’s website, SoundCloud page, and YouTube channel.